Scaling dimension text for use in print jobs and in exports

Exporting dimensions and exporting their explanatory texts

When printing and exporting drawings and their dimensions, EngView uses different scaling factors for the dimensions and the text accompanying them. You can use the global zoomable text setting to tell EngView to scale the text to dimensions.

Use separate scaling for dimensions and their texts

To make the dimensions' text scale along with the dimensions, you need to define a separate scaling texts.

See examples of printed and exported drawings (opens in a new window) and how dimension texts are set to display in a manner that makes them legible (opens in a new window).

This topic guides you how to define a scaling factor for dimensions and apply it onto drawing while preparing them for printing or exporting.

Defining a scaling factor

NOTE: The procedure that follows walks you through the steps that you make for defining a scaling factor in a 2D drawing. An alternative is to follow the procedure while setting up a drawing for exporting:

1. In a 1up or layout drawing, right-click a drawing's tab, and then click Properties.

2. In Scale dimension to, click and then click Edit scaling options.

The Edit Scaling Options dialog box appears.

Types of scaling patterns

You can use two patterns of scaling the dimension text:

• Scales: You set a multiplier for the globally set dimension text size. For example, if the globally set dimension text size is 9, the text that you will see on the printed or exported file will be multiplied by 9.
• Target Size: You set the size of the media on which you will print. The program uses this size to compute the multiplier by which to multiply the globally set dimension text size. Applying this multiplier ensures that once the drawing is printed out, you can see exactly the dimension text size set globally.

The two methods do not affect each other, and scaling patterns can be created independently.

3. Consider the type of scaling that you want to apply — scaling ratio or target size. The two approaches are covered separately in the two sections below.

Creating a scales ratio scaling pattern

4. In the Scales area, click Add.

A entry appears in the list.

5. In the Original Size and Exported Size columns, adjust the respective values for the scaling rule.
6. (Optional) In the Name column, type a name for the scaling rule.

TIP: You can type any name that has meaning for you. If no specific name is given for the scaling rule, a name is auto-generated from the values typed in Original Size and Exported Size.

7. (Optional) To create more scaling patterns, repeat Steps 4–6.

Creating a Target Size pattern

4. In the Target Sizes area, click Add.

An entry appears in the list.

5. In the Width and Height columns, type width and height values of the printing media — for example the A4 sizes (297 mm x 210 mm).
6. (Optional) In the Name column, type a name for the rule.

TIP: You can type any name that has meaning for you. If no specific name is given for the rule, a name is auto-generated from the values typed in Original Size and Exported Size.

7. (Optional) To create more scaling patterns, repeat Steps 4–6.

After you have defined scaling patterns, the Edit Scaling Options dialog box should look like this:

The scaling patterns are independent of one another — once defined here, they will appear in the drop-down lists in Scale dimensions to in the Drawing Properties dialog box and in Scale to in the Export dialog box.

7. Click OK to complete the procedure. You can now start using the scaling patterns in actual jobs. See the next procedure to learn how to apply them.

Applying scaling patterns

IMPORTANT: When you have applied a scaling pattern to a drawing, this makes the dimensions in this drawing zoomable automatically, regardless of whether zoomable text is set as a global default.

After you have defined scaling patterns, they are available as scaling options for printing and exports. See how to load them:

In the drawing's properties

1. In a 1up or layout drawing, right-click a drawing's tab, and then click Properties.

2. In Scale dimension to, click the drop-down list, and select the scaling that you want to apply.

When setting up an export. The scaling is available for the formats .pdf., eps.

1. In a 1up or layout drawing, on the File menu, click Export, and then in Scale to select the scaling that you want to apply in the export.